Turn your scars into stars
by speedofloveSK
Summary: Her boy's heart was so big and loving, easy to break. She would tell him just the necessary to extinguish his thirst. One-shot based on the prompt : Caskett kid (3/4 years old) asks why Kate has scars


**Hi guys. So, this happened last night. It wasn't planned at all and I needed a break from the revisions and I was feeling like writing. I wanted to write something easier than the fic I'm on and so when I saw the prompt it got stuck in my head. It's basically just fluffy sweet things. **

**I never write one shots so it was a bit weird and maybe I could have say more with that prompt but it sounded right as it is. **

**Prompt : Caskett kid (3/4 years old) asks why Kate has scars. (from the Castle fanfic prompts tumblr)**

**Next thing I'll write will be my on going fic. After my exams. In the meantime, there's this. **

**It had been corrected but I added some things just now and didn't want to ask for help again so, I just hope I was awake enough not to do too much idiot mistakes. Hehe **

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It's late at night, and the loft is plunged in darkness and for a long moment Kate lies flat on her back, her eyes still heavy with sleep, tempted to ignore whatever woke her blissful sleep. But she feels it again, a hard tug on her blanket followed by a soft cry. That does wake her.

Kate turns over to one side of the bed to check if it woke her husband too, but then she remembers he's not there. She turns her head to the other side, her tired eyes falling on a pair of large, blue terrified eyes, a wild storm of pure fear making her heart clench. She slowly sits up as she looks at the frightened 3-and half-years old. His face is scrunched and wet as much by big tears rolling down his cheeks as by the sweat that has his brown curls stuck to his forehead. He has his little bunny tightly pressed against him, just under his neck providing too little reassurance right now, as he sniffs through shaky and heavy breaths. Her own breath hitches a bit looking at her little boy as he now watches the ground looking almost ashamed. Her little joyful boy almost never cry and come at her at night, she knows he has nightmares sometimes and would just stay in his bed, hidden in his blankets, his bunny close to him. She heard and surprised him more than once like that, she would walk in is room after hearing his soft sobs, and he would be just like that, crying his face buried in his bunny. She told him it was okay to be scared, that she herself was scared sometimes too, but that boy was as stubborn as she was, if even not more. He wanted to be brave like mommy, because if daddy wasn't there he'd have to protect her, that's what he would tell her with bright and determined eyes. Her courageous little boy.

Then she heard it. A loud shattering noise tearing the sky open and almost making the walls shake. Oh, that was probably why he had come. He seemed to manage nightmares on his own as if he knew how to make them all go away, but thunderstorms? That was something he couldn't make go away, couldn't _control_.

"Oh, baby. Come here, come on." She invited him softly patting the bed next to her. He rises his head to her and the tears seems to pour out even more stronger now as he approaches her on shaky little legs.

She rises and takes him in her arms as she leans against the headbed and covers them up. Her little boy snuggles against her, his face buried in the crook of her neck as if, this time, the bunny isn't nearly enough. She tries to soothe him as best as she can, rocking him a bit and stroking his back but a lightning suddenly broke the darkness , bringing with him another loud bursting all around them and he freezes in her arms. She realizes that she doesn't feel his shaky puff of breaths, doesn't feel the way his body move with each heavy breaths against her anymore.

"Hey, Alex baby, breathe. It's okay, mommy's here." She tries softly at his hear as he seems to relax a bit, mumbling at her neck weak 'mommy,mommy"

"I know, I know it's scary but it cannot hurt you. Promise." She sees him look at her, dubious and she softly smile at him pressing her lips to his sweaty forehead.

"Why so loud mommy ? Woke me." He grumbled sleepily as he gets himself comfortable on her, his head against her chest and angled so that he could look at her.

"Because they're silly! You wanna know why they're making so much noise ?" He nodded vividly his eyes broaden and she knows she got him. He's a sucker for stories.

_Surprising, uh?_

She knows that if she finds a story to this, he will remember it and each times it would happen, he would no longer be scared.

"Okay well, you remember when daddy took you on bumper cars ? You two would crash into another car and it would make _a lot _of noise, right ?" He nodded again, seeming already engrossed, his eyes and his mouth wide.

"Well, the clouds are doing the same right now. They're bumping each others and because there's_ a lot _of clouds, it makes _a lot_ of noise. Nothing to be scared of, kid." Okay, obviously that wasn't the truth but she knows it's working.

He looks like he's thinking for a moment,considering her and he finally grins at her, this beautiful innocent smile illuminating his face. Ah, that's her boy.

"We should tell'em night is to sleep, we're not allowed to make noise when it's dark." He tells her his face so serious she can't help but laugh. God, she loves her boy. Both her boys.

Another loud noise broke the silence and she waits for her son's reaction but he just turns his head at the window, looking at the sky a finger over his lips.

"Shhh, time to sleep little clouds."

She smiles, broad, and kisses his forehead once again. He then he looks back at her, toying with the edge of her tank top and as the fabric gets a bit lower on her chest he stops, tracing a patterns up between her breasts. She knows what he's touching and that makes her swallow hard, her throat closing up. She made peace with it by now, she no longer tries to hide it or tries to forget it's here but her son touching it? She always feels like she needs to protect him from it when he touches it. Because he does a lot, and she knows he wants to know about it but he never dare.

Until now.

"Mommy? What is it?" He asks looking at her curiously but still tracing it, making light circles over her damaged skin.

She sighs running her hand through his short curls, sounds like story time. He deserves to know the truth and even if she would ease it a bit, it still stings, makes her feel like her scar gnaws at her. Showing that it's here and it already broke her life once.

"Mommy got hurt, a long time ago." She stops there a bit, looking at him because she knows that when a sentence involves "mommy" and "hurt", it rarely goes well.

He turns around and crawls onto her lap so that he's facing her and he looks intensely at her scars and then up looking so sad she has to, _has to_ wrap her arms around his little body, so warm against her.

"Hurt still, mommy?" She hears him ask, almost whispering, and she keeps running her hand in his hair, knows that it relaxes him.

"No baby, it did back then, but not anymore." Or maybe it still hurts moments like that when she has to explain her innocent boy why mommy has a hole so close to her heart, it still hurts a bit when Castle worships it at night, reminding them both that they made it and that's where they are now. But that's good. That makes her love the place where she is now even more.

"How ?" He asks rising his eyes to her as one of his hand plays with a strand of her hair,reminding her so much of him doing that when he was couple of months old.

"You know mommy's work is to catch bad guys, right ? Well, that day, the bad guy caught mommy because she didn't know he was there. Daddy saw it, he tried to do something but it was too late." She explains slowly, letting him digest her words.

"Daddy okay?" Her heart flutters and she smiles stroking his cheek.

"Yes baby. Daddy was okay. He was a little bit sad like you when mommy gets hurt, that's all." Well, yeah okay. He had been more than sad and he definitely wasn't okay but she couldn't say that to him. She couldn't tell him how it broke them both and teared them apart, couldn't say that for so long she couldn't even walk in the streets without a feeling of having a target in her back and she definitely couldn't tell him that's when she had told his dad the biggest lie she had ever said. Her boy's heart was so big and loving, easy to break. She would tell him just the necessary to extinguish his thirst.

" 'S because we love you mommy. You don't get hurt, please." He pleads her as he looks at her his nose bumping against hers , his two soft hands lying on her cheeks. She feels the tears rolling down , meeting her son's hands but she can't hold them when he's looking at her with so much love, like he would do anything to keep her safe. What did she do to deserve such an angel?

"Never, baby."

"Others ?" He asks her wiping at the wetness on her cheeks and looking down her body as if expecting to see them just like that.

She lifts her tank top a bit, enough to show her side and her stomach.

"There's one on my side" She looks at him as he strokes the long barely apparent scar. "But that's because of the first scar you saw, that one was made by the doctors, to save me."

"Save you." He shakes his head, frowning seriously. "Doctor saved mommy."

"That's right. And the other." She interrupts herself, leading his eyes to her lower belly.

"That one was...you, baby."

At that, his eyes shoot up at her as he shakes his head hard, tears gathering in both his eyes.

"Hurt you?" She hears him ask weakly and oh god, what did she do. _Idiot_

"Oh baby, no. No it wasn't- You didn't - ." _Shit_. What is she supposed to say now?

"It wasn't your fault baby. I swear and it didn't even hurt. You was the one hurting, baby." She attempts to say to calm him down as he still has heavy tears running. He slides his arms around her neck and wrap his legs around her, letting his head rest on her shoulder. He needs explanations, when he does this, he needs more. So she does. Stories always make it better.

She's surprised herself that they never have told him that story. _His_ story. It used to hurt, talking about his birth, she never had been so scared before that day. Not _that kind _of fear. The fear of losing something- _someone _that you created and wore inside you, kept safe for nine long months and then this.

"It was almost time for you to come to daddy and I, we were so happy baby. You stayed a really long time in mommy's belly, warm and growing. And, we couldn't wait to meet you. We loved you so much already. You already drove me crazy, always moving inside me. My squirming little worm, most of the time it was at night, just when me and daddy would get ready to sleep, you started to move around and you didn't calm down until daddy layed his hands on you and told you a night story. When he wasn't there like right now,working, you wouldn't calm down and I never knew what to do so one day I just tried to sing to you and you stopped." She stops and looks at him, his eyes are heavy and starting to close but she knows he's still listening and he won't want her to stop now.

"So like I said, one day it was time for you to meet us but there has been a little problem with you, the cordon that helped you to get feed and strong was around your neck and you couldn't breathe, it was hurting you. We were so scared to lose you baby. There wasn't any time so the doctor had to help you to come out faster. At first you wouldn't breathe for a moment and then baby, you let out the most loud and beautiful sound and only stopped when they brought you to me. Already a mommy's boy uh."

"Louder than clouds ?" She hears him ask so softly as he closes his eyes and lies his 'o' shaped mouth against her collarbones.

"A lot louder, baby," Kate says. She gently ruffles his curly head of hair and smiles gently at him.

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:)

Twitter : speedofloveSK


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